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Warning: This is not fake news. You are about to read something positive about journalism in 2018.

SlashRoots Foundation and Code for Africa are working together to give local journalists new and exciting digital tools: enabling them to mine data for new stories; to tell those stories in new and visually exciting ways; to allow their audiences to interact; and not just to confront the problem but to provide a solution too.

Amen, amen & amen is what I kept thinking while helping SlashRoots’ Denique Ferguson put together this blog post. The amount of times I’ve experienced having to work off only assumptions, often faulty, on numerous projects … I can’t count! A specialist in human-centred design, Denique (that’s her standing in the photo) shared her thoughts from a recent trip to run a workshop in Cape Town, South Africa:

There’s a slow realisation among Jamaican organisations that website/app/insert-technology-of-choice-here “users” are living, breathing human beings. And as our society gets more digital, more is at stake when we don’t make room for humanity in our projects.

Many businesses might not yet know, but under the proposed Data Protection Act, they could soon have to comply with new measures to protect data privacy. The moment that a cook shop collects a name and mobile number for an order, then by virtue of collecting that information the law will view it as a “Data Controller”. It will then have to register, pay a fee, appoint a “Data Protection Officer” and file an annual report…or pay a fine!

In fact, we as a business will also have to! Our newest client, SlashRoots Foundation, specialise in ICT for development and so are advocating that the legislation better reflect everyday Jamaican realities. SlashRoots principal Matthew McNaughton presented to Parliament Tuesday using the cook shop as an everyday example to break down the implications; and to suggest how the Act could become more practical.

Call centre jobs, climate change, murders and tiefing – are among Jamaica’s most pressing existential questions, jokes David Soutar of SlashRoots, the Kingston-based social impact organisation that uses technology to tackle some of those issues here and abroad. Continue reading →